The lead candidate of the leftist coalition PS/Livre/BE/PAN for the Lisbon City Hall met today with disability associations at the headquarters of the Socialist Party’s Lisbon Urban Area Federation. Describing the conversation as “very useful,” the candidate emphasized the consensus that the city “needs to be more accessible.”
“There are numerous barriers to accessibility, whether on sidewalks, accessing buses, broken elevators, for example, in the subway, and escalators, or the lack of audible signals on most traffic lights for the visually impaired to cross,” she enumerated.
The socialist candidate stressed that Lisbon “is not a comfortable city for pedestrians” and is “even less friendly” for children, the elderly, and pedestrians with disabilities. “If it’s not easy already without those limitations, now imagine when we have them,” she added.
The associations conveyed to Alexandra Leitão the importance of having “a program for adapting homes,” particularly concerning “accessibility within the home,” both in municipal neighborhoods and outside.
“What we were told here, by more than one person, is that Lisbon used to be better. Lisbon was once a more exemplary city, both for pedestrians and, for instance, in terms of independent living centers. There are great pilot projects for independent living centers that enable people with disabilities to become autonomous, also relieving informal caregivers, but those pilots were never expanded,” she pointed out.
According to the head of the “Living Lisbon” coalition, disability associations believe the capital “once was an ideal model in this matter, which it no longer is today.”
“I would very much like it to return to being so under my mayoral presidency,” she expressed, estimating the importance of a “sensitization campaign” to “change mindsets.”
Participating in this meeting were associations such as ACAPO – Association of the Blind and Partially Sighted of Portugal, CERCI Lisbon, National Federation of Social Solidarity Cooperatives, National Mechanism for Monitoring the Implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, Parents in Network, Disabled Veterans Association, Salvador Association, and NED — Disability Studies Center.
“We have planned in the coalition program, in the city’s governing program, the creation of specific support programs for rents in families with special needs, and also a program for adapting homes,” as well as a review of the pedestrian accessibility plan, detailed the socialist candidate, reiterating these commitments to the associations.
Besides Alexandra Leitão, the other candidates for the Lisbon City Hall in the municipal elections on October 12 include the current president Carlos Moedas (PSD/CDS-PP/IL), João Ferreira (CDU-PCP/PEV), Bruno Mascarenhas (Chega), Ossanda Líber (New Right), José Almeida (Volt), Adelaide Ferreira (ADN), Tomaz Ponce Dentinho (PPM/PTP), and Luís Mendes (RIR).
